


The Lure

by afteriwake



Series: Whatever Remains [1]
Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Adopted Khan, Adopted Sibling Relationship, Alternate Universe - Detectives, Alternate Universe - Fusion, Alternate Universe - Sherlock (TV) Fusion, Background Case, Bickering, Blogger Kirk, Consulting Detective Khan, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Gen, Government Official Sulu, Roommates, Sibling Rivalry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-26
Updated: 2016-06-26
Packaged: 2018-07-18 09:05:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,173
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7308661
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/afteriwake/pseuds/afteriwake
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Khan gets an anonymous case that piques his interest, but his adopted brother tells him not to take it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Lure

**Author's Note:**

  * For [GreenSkyOverMe](https://archiveofourown.org/users/GreenSkyOverMe/gifts).



> So a little while back, **GreenSkyOverMe** _finally_ started watching Sherlock and brought up the idea to me of me writing an AU where Khan is a consulting detective a la Sherlock. This isn't _quite_ what she had envisioned but it's where my mind went. Now, I've never written a fusion before, so I'm not sure if this is generally how it goes, but I wanted to set it in San Francisco as opposed to London because it's easier to explain a bunch of American characters in America that way, and I made a few concessions to things. And, as this is a series, things that aren't explained in this story will be explained in subsequent stories, I promise. But please, I hope you enoy this story that starts things off!

He _despised_ getting anonymous cases.

He stared at the data file he’d received through encrypted channels and tapped his fingers next to his laptop. He wasn’t entirely sure if someone was playing a game with him or not. He was the world’s only consulting detective, after all, and some people thought it was all a lark. They would send him “cases” to waste his time. This case...he’d never heard of an organization called “Starfleet” before, though he assumed it had to do with space travel. Trivial nonsense. He deleted most astronomical data out of his mind palace because it was meaningless.

But this message said there was more to the organization than met the eye. That it had far reaches. That it wasn’t just a technological outfit. It affected monetary institutions, educational systems, governments...and that it was corrupt.

And they wanted it exposed.

It sounded more like a job for Wikileaks than the likes of him. He solved _crimes_ , not conspiracies.

He glanced over at his flatmate, James Kirk. They were almost like oil and water at times, though they got along surprisingly well as well. If anyone had asked if Khan Noonien Singh, or “John Harrison” as he went by these days, thanks to that damnable scandal in university that his brother had buried deep _deep_ down in every database in the world by now, could get along with anyone, James Kirk would not have been at the top of that list, he knew that. James was a brash man in some respects, but an experience with the war had changed him. Mellowed him. He could still be cocky and was still an annoying flirt with the women who were drawn to him for some godforsaken reason, but he was a loyal friend who for some reason had decided to be loyal to _him_.

He often wondered why. He was not on the side of angels, that was for sure. He had done quite a few things over the years that were...less than savory, for lack of a better term. Bordering on illegal. Quite possibly immoral. He was not a _good_ man, though some said he could be a _great_ man. He didn’t bother to make the distinction half the time. He was a genius, he was an arse, and he didn’t give a damn about most people. 

And yet people gave a damn about him.

He didn’t understand it.

“I may have a case,” he said.

James looked up from his own laptop. No doubt typing up the results of their latest jaunt on a case together. He wondered why he bothered. Not that James wasn’t a bad writer, he supposed. He’d read James’s blog a few times and it was...decent. Not excellent, but not sub-par. It portrayed him in a favourable light, for the most part, it was amusing, and it relayed the details well enough. It was adequate. But damn it, it got more hits than his own blog and that seemed grossly unfair. He shouldn’t feel jealous about it but he was. “Anything interesting?” he said. 

“Something about an organization called ‘Starfleet’ with potentially long reaching fingers,” Khan said, steepling his fingers together in front of his face as he leaned back in his chair. “It just depends on if we get a visit from our favorite government bureaucrat in the next half hour or so.”

James smirked at that. “Half hour?”

“Hikaru is nothing if not prompt,” he said with a scowl. He did not have any fondness for his adopted brother. He had no fondness at all for his entire adopted family, really. Not that they had treated him as a second-class citizen, but it was the fact that he had been ripped from the home he loved, the country he preferred, and brought to San Francisco and left to rot. As soon as he had been old enough to escape and return to England for university he had, but he had mucked that up when he had gotten involved in drugs, and it had only been through Hikaru’s prodigious skills with manipulating computer databases that had saved him from potentially catastrophic embarrassment. There were few that knew the full truth of his past, though James was among them, and he preferred to keep it that way.

He studied the message a bit more when he heard his brother’s familiar footsteps on the stair. “Hikaru?” James asked.

“Ten minutes,” Khan said with a nod and a sneer. “He exceeded my expectations.” He didn’t bother to look up when his brother let himself into their apartment with the key he knew his brother had. “The polite thing to do is knock.”

“Do not take that case, John,” Hikaru said.

“Oh, come now. We’re all friendly here. You can use my _real_ name,” Khan said, pulling his attention back to his laptop and the message on it.

“You don’t understand the implications of what you’re being asked to do,” Hikaru said, sounding a bit irritated.

“I am not a simpleton, you know,” Khan said. He would not lose his calm around his brother. He would not give him the satisfaction. “I know perfectly well the potential implications. Governments could collapse, the world could be in ruin. Your precious position in the government could be in jeopardy.” He looked up finally to see his brother standing there with his PA nearby on her mobile. “Your PA could leave you in the dust and you’d flail about without her steady hand to guide you.” He was pleased to see _that_ elicited a reaction from the usually stoic Uhura: a slight upturn at the corners of the lips.

“Take this seriously, John,” Hikaru said exasperatedly. Good. _He_ was losing _his_ cool. Any chance he got to needle his brother was a good day.

“Go back to your office, Hikaru. I promise I will not consider taking the case too closely,” Khan said, rolling his eyes.

Hikaru narrowed his eyes and then nodded. “Fine. Just don’t cause me any more embarrassment.”

“But of course,” Khan murmured, watching his brother leave.

James frowned. “I thought you said you had a case,” he said when Hikaru’s footsteps had receded into silence.

“We do,” Khan said, moving his laptop to the side and pushing his chair back. “I told my brother I wouldn’t consider it closely. There is nothing to consider closely because I already _have_ considered it. I’ve agreed to take the case.” He went to the coat rack and reached for his coat, a magnificent dark gray Belstaff coat. It was one of his most prized possessions. He slipped it on, waiting impatiently for James to get the hint. After a moment James got up and went to grab his leather jacket off the rack as well. “Come on. We don’t have a moment to lose.” And with that, he made his way to the door, already three steps into starting to deduce what to do to start sorting out the conspiracy of what exactly “Starfleet” was all about.


End file.
